identity

May 5, 2023May 5, 2023

Episode 95SN: Identity Shift without Identity Crisis in Motherhood: Anne’s Story, Part I

When your interests are shifted to the back seat to make room for the baby’s, you WILL have feelings about it, but most of us never talk about it because it doesn’t fit our idea of motherhood.

Today we discuss some of these challenges, and ways of making sense of them. I talk to a writer who is also a mother of three about the ideas she brought with her into this giant transition and how she works to balance her family life and work life; the difficulty of this balancing act and the feelings it brought up for her. I also talk with a fantastic therapist who specializes in helping mothers feel comfortable in motherhood by giving us valuable ways to think about and reframe what may be uncomfortable and conflicting feelings–like love and connection with the baby, but also moments of anger or regret– as we all navigate the job of parenting. what follows is the first part of my conversation with both women.

To find Anne Zimmerman’s work (An Extravagant Hunger: The Passionate Years of M.F.K. Fisher, Love In A Dishand Other Culinary Delights and M.F.K. Fisher: Musings on Wine & Other Libations, check out her website. Here is her writing on related topics.

You can find Jessica Sourci, from Family Tree Wellness here

Audio Transcript

Welcome to War Stories from the Womb.This is a show that shares true experiences of getting pregnant being pregnant and giving birth to help shift the common cultural narrative away from the glossy depictions of this enormous transition you can find on all kinds of media, to a more realistic one. It also celebrates the incredible resilience and strength it takes to create another person and release that new person from your body into the world. I’m your host, Paulette Kamenecka. I’m a writer and an economist and the mother of two girls and boy did I struggle with this transition….

Today we discuss conflicting feelings about motherhood. i talk to a mother of three about the ideas she brought with her into this giant transition and how she works to balance her family life and work life and I also talk with a fantastic therapist who specializes in helping mothers feel comfortable in motherhood by giving us valuable ways to think about and reframe what me may see as conflicting feelings–like love and connection with irritation and anger– as we all navigate the important job of parenting. what follows is the first part of my conversation with both women.

Paulette 0:03

Hi thanks so much for coming on the show. Can you introduce yourself and tell us where you’re from?

Anne 0:07

My name is Anne Zimmerman, and I am a writer and mother living in Portland, Oregon.

Paulette 0:15

Anne it’s so lovely to have you on. I should confess that you were my writing teacher at Stanford for a classified suck and you’re a beautiful, beautiful writer. And that was a great class. So I’m excited to have him on. So one thing that’s interesting about your story is you have three kids. You are not Mormon but you grew up in Salt Lake City, which I think of as a pretty happy place and a place filled with big families. So maybe correct me if I’m wrong. Is that your experience?

Anne 0:44

Yeah, you’re right. And it’s interesting because I’ve gone through various periods in my life where I think about the Mormon Church and the influence of the Mormon Church and the influence of the psychology of the Mormon church a lot because it is really interesting. Parents are not from Utah. And my family has not never been Mormon, but I was born in Salt Lake City. I lived there until I was 18. And my parents are still there. So I continue to go back there fairly frequently. And so it is baked into who I am in it. For those that have been to Salt Lake. You will know that it’s laid out on a grid with the Mormon temple at the center all the street names are keyed off of the Mormon, Mormon temple in the center of the city. So I grew up in a in a beautiful old grid neighborhood and of the like 18 houses on either side of the street. At the time, there were maybe only three other families that were not Mormon. I mean, maybe an older couple or two who did not have children. But in terms of the kids I grew up with, and there were a lot of them. There were at one point there was a family across the street had eight. There were you know, big families and the Mormon church was just pervasive, and I knew it, because I always knew that we weren’t Mormon. It was very clear. We were not going to go to the Mormon church. We were not going to go to the Mormon church just to see what was happening or try it out or anything like that. But it wasn’t until I got a lot older that I was like, oh, so what what was that like, you know, most if not all of the women at home, I should pause and say I only have one brother who’s five years younger than I am. So I did sort of experience something different within my own family unit, but just in terms of being out in the neighborhood or playing with other people from school. Or just being at school, this culture of child after child after child and also everything just seeming really I mean, you’re right. It’s like it doesn’t describe it but perfect and happy is is really true. I think you see it now in social media. I used to have a more than obsession with following in sort of humans, the lives of Mormon and mommy bloggers back when blogging was more of a thing or Instagram because it is in a way it is something that’s so familiar and comfortable to me. Yeah, just that whole we’re gonna have a baby and then we’re gonna have another baby and everything’s gonna be happy and everything is gonna be perfect and everybody’s gonna match. And we’re gonna make cookies and dad comes home and we play basketball and you know, just this very wholesome, very happy, very clean, white, obviously, culture and just I don’t know, just even talking about it. There is still something that is like, appealing about that, even though now being a mother. I sort of see that there that there’s, you know, dark dirty corners. There have to be there.

Paulette 3:48

Yeah, having kids is too complicated to have just one

Anne 3:52

more than I mean. We do have three children. And when I went into my motherhood experience, I think I thought we would only have two and we wanted a third child, we plan to have a third child, but that adds to the chaos factor. And sometimes when I’m in just very normal, but chaotic moments at home, I’m like, wow, so then what’s it like if you get each kid to their lesson, that’s their passion that they are willing to live or die for, you know, three tantrums or whatever it just it’s work. It’s it’s an incredible amount of patience and management. And chaos

Paulette 4:28

yeah, it’s certainly it’s harder than a lot, right? parenting has very good marketing has we all go into it thinking it’s not going to be quite as hard as it is?

Anne: Right?

P: We focus on that on the easy, lovely parts that everyone wants to share and glorify and there’s you know, reasons to do that. But it is an incomplete picture. So it sounds like you grew up thinking you were gonna have a family.

A: Yes. Yes.

P: And was it easy to get pregnant the first time?

A: Yes.

P: And how was that pregnancy?

Anne 5:01

I would say that of the three. That was my most difficult pregnancy and not because there was anything’s physically difficult about it. I mean, you know, just the normal, the normal stuff, early morning sickness, the changes in the body, all that kind of stuff. Everything was very, very routine. I was still pretty young, especially by San Francisco standards. I had a difficult birth, but the whole pregnancy was very healthy and very normal. But I think I also I had I had published a book I was teaching I had wanted to have children my entire life and then after getting married, that it amplified, it definitely wanted to become pregnant and have this child but then I remember at the time feeling like it was just super practical stuff. We have the San Francisco and but where are we going with this baby? You know, just all of a sudden it was like I remember feeling like, Oh, I knew I wanted this and I thought about this and chose this. And yet now that it’s happening, no one told me it was going to be to negotiate some of these things and to decide I was privileged in that I am able to take care of our children but just sort of like where I was going to draw the boundaries.

Paulette 6:21

Today we’re lucky to talk with Jessica Sorci and LMFT perinatal mental health certified and certified internal family systems therapist and Founding Director of Family Tree wellness. And we’re here to talk broadly about maternal ambivalence. Jessica, thanks so much for coming on.

Jessica Sorci 6:39

Thanks for having me. Call it. It’s fun to be here.

Jessica: 6:53

That’s right. Yeah, there’s so much pressure on moms to be quote unquote, good moms or perfect moms. And there’s a lot of societal ideas about what motherhood supposed to look like. And feel like and that pressure is alive in every every mom. I think we just we all get that memo and feel compelled to embody something that is really not real and doesn’t exist some sort of perfection and yeah, and then having having those those real feelings that are not in the realm of bliss, and ease and connection really feels threatening, I think to to the ideas we hold about motherhood and maybe to our own sense of being decent for. For many of us, we want to be more than decent, we want to be exceptional moms. And when we start noticing that we’re actually feeling those things you mentioned, you know, some might be irritation, it might actually be rage, resentment, regret, is definitely a very big, common feeling that moms have and it makes a ton of sense that those those sorts of feelings really threaten that clean image that we think we’re supposed to aspire to. So not only is it uncomfortable to have the idea of being perceived as something other than a perfect mom, or a really good mom, or supermom in terms of how people are seeing us as we’re so comfortable inside in our inner world to hold the complexity of those polarized parts that seem like they need to do away with each other, you know, the perfect mom feelings, or maybe we could say in a more specific way those feelings of I wanted this baby or this child, I value motherhood. I enjoy the feeling of connection. There are there aspects of me that really like taking care of someone. Sometimes, I’ve got these feelings of real pride in my child, a feeling that I understand them and I am in tune. And that’s got kind of a lot of dopamine around it and a lot of feeling maybe actualizing what I was meant to do on Earth in some way, my purpose. So there’s all of that. And then to have other feelings that are completely almost seemed like they delete or erase or destroy the good feelings, right? Those ones that come up that are like so so black and white, so absolute around this was a horrible mistake. I really should never have done this. There is no room for me in this picture anymore. And it seems like it’s all or nothing. It’s the baby or it’s me. Somebody’s got to take one for the team and I’m sick of taking one for the team right like I’ve I’ve held back and maybe exiled so much of my own need in my own truth, to be of service to this child and there is a feeling inside of being really done with that of hating it of wanting my own. Well being back on use of space and time for myself. It feels like those two are just wildly in opposition.

Anne 10:41

I had watched women not work outside of a home to choose motherhood as their profession and then and I had been like, maybe that’ll be me. Maybe that’s what I want to for sure do during a certain period of my life. And my husband was supportive of it for his own reasons. His mom had been away a lot when he was little and he was like, Yeah, we’re on the same page. This is what we’re going to do and then it just very quickly kind of became oh but what if that was wrong, what if that’s not actually what I want, but then how am I going to negotiate all that nice still? I still feel like I’m trying I mean, every Sunday night I’m looking at the calendar and going okay, what do I have to do other for other people? What do I have to do for myself? What am I getting paid for? What do I get? You know, what do I What is the writing that I want to do that I might not be getting paid for yet but in some ways is more important than any of the other stuff. I have to put that in all right. I don’t feel like myself. It’s very tricky.

Paulette 11:37

But yeah, the the the happy marriage of parenthood and a job is a really difficult thing. And I remember early on thinking oh, now I’ve reached what I’ve heard many women describe which is I feel like I’m failing at both jobs. So that seems Yes. Now I’ve reached the level right i i can’t fully put myself into my work and I can’t fully put myself in a way that I want to be present with my child and this is the world that we live in.

Anne 12:06

And I am incredibly lucky. My schedule has always been very flexible. My students have been very understand that you know, they’re they’re adults with hearts typically in mind, they’re incredibly understanding if there is ever a time when something has to shift a little bit, but just today, you know, it is 2023 But between yesterday and today, I think for alerts that there’s COVID at the preschool you know sort of starting to infiltrate and cutting hours a little bit because two teachers are sick and it’s like, the preschool that my littlest child goes to, is close to a hospital. So there’s a lot of working professional parents. What can people do? I mean, we’re so lucky and sometimes they think about doing something different. In air quotes, they don’t really know what that is, but it’s hard it I don’t eat I don’t know, it’s an incredibly hard balance

Paulette 12:58

and finds the spiritual within her about I am a creative person. I’m a writer. I want to do this work, but I’m also a mother and how those things fit together.

Speaker 3 13:08

Yes, yeah. So as I think about, you know, what, what the parts of a mother or mom parts might look like in a in a kind of generalizable or predictable way. I think there are those those parts that emerge when you have a child for basically all of us. We call one in particular the baby’s representative. There’s like a part that shows up in mom’s consciousness. That’s the baby’s rep and it’s here to advocate for that baby, and it’s here to pull all of mom’s attention and energy and resources toward the baby and does that through you know, brain changes and other physiology. It does that through kind of CO opting the cognition and preoccupying the thoughts of mom, and it does that through attachment through building a bond, and that sense of real deep caring. So you’ve got that whole babies rep going on that’s so inarguably occupying it takes up a lot of space. But you were a person before you had your child and you had those things you’re naming that and felt around your own creativity, your own reason for being your own inspiration and ways that you got your dopamine before you had this baby. That didn’t go away. It got kind of elbowed out when the babies are out showed up. But I think of those as sort of self interested parts and they do have to take a backseat. You know, in the beginning I think it just happens it’s like you don’t have any choice. Your physiology demands it when you’re giving birth and in the days that follow when you’re really not yourself on a physiological level. Sometimes that’s months that follow for some folks years, but the self interested parts are there and there’s nothing wrong with them. You know, I think the system can start to feel like it’s a threat to the baby rep. And all that is aspiring for and you are holding in your one nervous system, essentially two nervous systems. So how, how gracefully can this one individual mom hold multiple nervous systems? And multiple agendas, the babies and hers there is no getting around that it’s complicated and taxing and requires a lot of adjustment and a lot of work. But you know the the only answer really is becoming more conscious and being deliberate in your self compassion. That self compassion starts to open up more space so that maybe both things can exist. Maybe you can be a good mom who is tending to the baby really beautifully, and has her own needs her own reality her own, you know creativity or desire for productivity or let’s Let’s even say desire for control because there’s not a lot of control in mothering. You don’t get to kind of exact your own visions and volition like your baby runs. Oh, they are and you’re sort of attuning and following their lead. So, you know, to respect in a compassionate way they don’t impulse and your own desire to follow your own dreams to make them the color you want. The tone you are feeling. You know that that’s real and true and does not go away with motherhood. Very long time and I mean it goes so deep right? You don’t get to take a nap when you want to take a nap. You don’t get to think so you want to think that was a really hard one for me. I wanted some space to think like that and they would be interrupted every 30 seconds or less. I was so so frustrating and also created a lot of grief. I missed having that space with myself. So I think we have to be really respectful. How much babies wrap is asking us to give. And in that respect, there’s compassion right like they’ve given it up for a long time. was not easy. Let’s find some space for you to have your own self interest.

Paulette 17:52

Now that my kids are grown, my sense is your grandparents. That’s the way to make it work and and but then you have to be okay with grandparents parenting your children.

Anne 18:04

Right. And that’s actually a really important waves to lift the veil on on Utah on Salt Lake City on the Mormon church to some degree. Of course. You can’t make a blanket statement, but it is in a way it’s in the village. You know, I remember at one point, the people who lived across the street for us grandparents lived tutors. You know there there was just this really flowing back and forth and we wanting to have children younger, which grandparents are younger, which means we are all with whatever childcare or something during the summer going on vacations, you know whatever just generally being participatory factor and you have a lot of siblings sometimes, you know, and so it’s also like you can be it. It’s, you know, answer those houses together and that is that I’m not sure if that really clicked for me until after I get there. Maybe we don’t have family. We don’t have family living around. That’s where this whole weird fantasy of being like, you know, Norman Norman, I’m not sure it was ever that explicit but this desire to have kids and have this feeling of fullness and busyness and excitement and fun and like that’s where this is going to hit a real roadblock is because we don’t have any support men pandemic it and then then we all know, yeah, got parents of young children and families and that type of thing. You know?

Paulette 19:42

Yeah, that made it much more stark for sure to say oh, actually you’re I guess what? Super hard. So let’s talk for a second about the birth. And actually the pregnancy. You walk by it because you say oh, it was normal. I remember in the first trimester falling asleep on my keyboard at school and and just being knocked out by fatigue in a way that I never understood or

Unknown Speaker 20:08

read about that. That

Paulette 20:11

was just it was such a shocking thing for me. People say oh, you’re gonna be nauseous and Oh, you’ll be tired. But the feeling of that is so much different than the description that it’s just shows it’s so hard to create another person and we just take it for granted because that’s what I do. Yeah,

Anne 20:29

yeah. So yeah, so I mean, I think one thing that popped into my mind but when I left once I had one child, subsequent pregnancies, I just looked like a rock because I was tired. But with my first pregnancy, I remember being awake in the night a lot, which was really notable because my husband has struggled with insomnia for most of his life. And I remember being so angry that he wasn’t awake was like okay, I’m finally awake. Where are you think that you are sleeping soundly. So insomnia and then also I plan as the illness often is. And I remember when there was the bombing at the two men are sort of on the loose on and this was back when I was on Twitter and Twitter was kind of a easy place to be. And I just didn’t sleep practically all when they needed to know if they were going to find these people and it was so weird because I hadn’t ever felt like that water in the business and that restlessness before and I remember finally getting to the point at 330 or four o’clock in the morning orient that I just have to get up. You know, I did a lot of food writing and in written a biography about it. I just have to get up and start cooking because there’s nothing else to do. I’m not going to sleep. And that was definitely a nervous kind of again with I was very anxious about what was going to happen. You know, my husband’s mother was notably dying while I was pregnant, which is interesting element to the whole thing. And I remember he had gotten to be with her over Fourth of July weekend. I was due to have a baby in September, so I was seven months pregnant. And I didn’t go to a barbecue and I remember telling the women at the barbecue that it was because they needed to figure out how I was going to organize my closet and in my mind that was just because this is the most important thing to do right now. This is it. This is this is it, which is in some ways I will that just stem so much the stereotypical new nervous moms spinning her wheels about you know, whatever. But at the time, I think so much of it was feeling really destabilize my own identity really destabilized. It did have something to do, obviously with the fact that I was growing human in my body and all of the effort it takes to do that. But so much more of it was about me and feeling really destabilized. And, and also, again, kind of going back to both my childhood in Utah but also just the culture around pregnancy, feeling like there was I could not say anything to anybody. You know, it’s not like I didn’t want to have my child. It was just it was just so much bigger and realer and so much more of an identity ship before I even had the child than I ever anticipated. And I remember here’s something I remember that is interesting as I remember being probably I would say, I don’t know, still early in my pay, let’s say four months pregnant. And I was teaching a night class in person. And I was leaving to go to the class. And I took a picture because my mom sent me her shirt or something, took a picture and texted it to her and I said no, you gonna be able to tell that I’m pregnant question question mark, exclamation mark. And she wrote back and she said something like, Do you not want them to know that you’re pregnant? And in that moment, I was like, I do know that I’m pregnant. I do not want them to think that anything about our dealings or our interaction is in any way influenced by the fact that I am right now that I’m going to watch out.

Paulette 24:32

For and she talks about being anxious or during the pregnancy about this identity shift. She anticipated that she’s going to have an identity shift. And it is this, I think making space for these two identities like you talked about. So do you have any suggestion about how we one goes about?

Unknown Speaker 25:33

She’s

Speaker 3 25:41

that natural and inevitable, but good girl. You do so it’s not a bad thing to encounter that grief. The fact that there’s grief and loss doesn’t mean it’s bad or that you should avoid it or that there’s nothing better on the other side. Having that clarity should add about identity shift.

Speaker 3 26:20

Energy or access to your own resources. You are working which are very different in terms of your your body and your being. It’s temporary you know that the massive loss a massive hit is temporary. That’s the good news right you’re gonna get much more of yourself. So having having some softness around the surrender, I think surrender is usually the most graceful way to go in like and it is and there is a loss. You know, people don’t say that I heard a podcast recently where a therapist was talking about moms having ambivalence, and that sometimes there are moments of hate and she said nobody likes the word hate so I’ve actually stopped using it. And I thought to myself, of course, can can we just allow our parts to feel what they feel the more we can make space for that is truth and honesty, the better the playing field for the baby and for being understood, making sense being seen not feeling shameful or like there’s anything wrong with her. Not starting to think of herself as a failure or more or less of a mom. No, that doesn’t mean that your feelings can be here. No matter what they are all all parts and all feelings are welcome. And you can be great

Paulette 27:53

Are you imagining that they’ll think something negative?

Anne 27:55

Yes, definitely, like negative rather than positive which is so funny because I actually also remember that when they found out I was just being over me and one of the students in this particular class no one of course, no one thought your brain has been diminished by this. But I think yes, I think I’m worried that they would think that somehow. I guess specifically the comments that I might make on their work would somehow be not valid for us.

Paulette 28:37

Totally interesting. Why is it so powerful driver of your behavior in a way that you’re not necessarily totally conscious? Of in the moment and that anxiety? Jamil and appropriate, and I guess I regret that there’s a negative overlay on that to say oh, the anxious first time you should be anxious, guess what? Right. Every single thing has changed. I have no idea where this is. Going. I just heard some statistic that 70% of pregnancies are relatively normal and go off without a hitch. But you don’t know if you’re in that camp. And it’s just for many people because we don’t know we’re relatively young. It’s the first time you were introduced to this idea that you are not in control of your body. And that’s such a weird thing to feel and to experience. And I remember saying to my husband while I was pregnant, my belly was growing. I must be doing this wrong, because this is the weirdest thing I’ve ever experienced. Except there’s no cause and effect here that I can. You’re no longer in charge of your life. Yeah, true. True and I feel like that’s a line that’s slowly being revealed to you. Right? The nausea and the fatigue is a good entry into that idea because it’s nothing that you you’re doing in the moment. Something else is going on in your body that you can’t control. It does become more and more true right as you get further along. So something about your first birth, what were you hoping to do

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

May 5, 2023May 5, 2023

Episode 95: Identity Shift without Identity Crisis in Motherhood: Anne’s Story, Part I

October 28, 2022October 28, 2022

Episode 70SN: Losing your Identity in Motherhood: Marnie’s story

Today’s guest had a number of challenges with the physical aspects of pregnancy–she and her partner had trouble getting pregnant initially, and her third child was born in June of 2020, very much in the heart of covid, which invited it’s own challenges; but what really surprised her was the loss of the person she used to be. She found motherhood to be both beautiful and completely overwhelming and had to work hard to reestablish her boundaries and her life after kids. Her experience becomes the motivation for a new company in an effort to help other mom’s navigate this enormous transition a little easier.

To find Marnie’s company Rumbly, click here

Audio Transcript

Paulette: Hi welcome to war stories from the womb

I’m your host paulette kamenecka. I’m a writer and an economist and the mother of two girls

Paulette: All right, thanks so much for coming on the show. Can you tell us your name and where you’re from?

Marnie: Yeah. My name is Marnie. I am from Toronto, Canada.

P: Oh, thank you. I was a Greek city right I love Toronto.

M: You know, I I had grown to love it. After I’d gone off to for university and came back I started to really appreciate it. I think I just saw it as an adult and I started it in a different light than I did growing up. So now now I get here.

P: Excellent. That’s a well chosen. Order. And everything. So morning we’re gonna talk about we’re gonna talk about your business which is related to your birth experience. So we’ll get to that and I’m gonna go further back and ask a question about the family team from imagining that influenced kind of what you thought you wanted going into creating a family did you grew up with siblings?

M: I did. I have three sisters. So I’m one of one of four, one of four girls.

P: That’s pretty lucky. And are you all close in age?

M: We are all about three years apart. So fairly close. So we’re similar life stages, I guess growing up.

P: Nice. Where are you? In the lineup?

M: I remember three, oh, and middle child and a lot, a lot of personality traits of that stereotype.

P: I’m also the third of four so i

M: Oh, wow. That’s amazing.

P: So growing up, did you think I want kids? I will want kids

M: Yes. 100%. I always wanted kids but it wasn’t my lifelong mission. I just knew when I was ready, it would come so I wasn’t like I had some friends who was just we’re trying to go through the process of going to school and getting there just so they could finding a partner just so they could have children. And for me it was it was a very more selfish journey, I guess of achieving what I wanted to achieve personally before kids came into it but knowing that family is something that I absolutely, absolutely want. Absolutely.

P: Okay, so when you when you were going to get pregnant, what did you think pregnancy would be like?

M: Like Emily’s? I Anna and I have to say that I didn’t. I’m someone who doesn’t really think about much. I kind of just go for it. But I thought I was just something I wanted so badly. I never thought much about it. I just thought it’s gonna be great. It’s just I want the end result. So I think I was just very focused on whatever it is to get me to that point. So I’m gonna get pregnant. I’m gonna grow belly and I’m gonna push baby. And that was kind of all I thought I really think much else about it. But knowing that I’d have this fries at the end, which would be my future children.

P: Yeah, that’s kind of a having talked to many people is kind of a smart way to go into it without very many details already worked out in your head of what it’s going to look like. So was it easy to get pregnant?

M: No, it wasn’t. It was very stressful. But we did and I cannot feel more thankful lucky, fortunate. Happy to have three children.

P: So for the first one, walk us through that one because usually there’s a lot learned on the first one.

M: So I actually had incredibly wood to get pregnant or

P: just the whole walkthrough that one slowly and then you can pick and choose about the other two.

M: It just timing perspective. It just to each one took I would say like a year or two longer than I would have liked. So it was it was a waiting game and of course, the longer you wait, the more frustrating it gets and, you know starts to the process of impacting your relationships, whether it be with your partner, or a lot for me, my friends who were able to get pregnant really easily are starting to build their families out and then that jealousy which again, I never had, because I was never in like a rush to do it. That that really creeped up on me. And then that started impacting I think a lot of my relationships with my friends. Yeah, it’s hard. It’s hard

P : to look around you it looks so easy, right? Yeah,

M : it’s it’s so easy in it and again, it brings out these these these these character these characteristics in you that you didn’t notice as I was never jealous person, but as I noticed everyone around me and I felt like getting pregnant like this this jealousy type of rage inside me with just kept growing and that was that was really hard and I didn’t like it. It was something I battled but I don’t think it wasn’t something that I could really quiet at the same time. But needless to say we did eventually get pregnant and like I said, I’m so fortunate to have free beautiful, healthy, amazing children today.

P: So let’s let’s talk about getting pregnant the first time did you find out with a home kit? Are you involved with doctors or how does that all go?

M: Yeah, so we took pregnancy tests with all them confirmed it with doctors kind of a very, I guess, linear path after that.

P :But so exciting to get the positive pregnancy test?

M: Oh, like I couldn’t control myself love like tears and joy and my heart racing. I did my chest in with all of them with all of them. It was it. Each one was truly an equal blessing that I felt.

P: And did you guys end up going through? Did you think there was something wrong in that it took that long or were doctors like no, this is what it takes?

M: Yes, but it wasn’t equipped with the education I think to know to really question that. I think today’s Today’s a very different environment. And I think I would have seeked help earlier on. In my process hadn’t had I known that was an option or to actually question these things rather than just kind of internalizing it and keeping it between me and my partner.

P: So it sounds like in part because you’re surrounded by people who are getting pregnant easily. It’s not obvious to you that that this is a medical issue and maybe you should go and talk to a doctor

M: right and you know, and social media wasn’t as strong then and there wasn’t as many conversations around fertility which there’s an infertility which there’s there’s so many more conversations and and companies and and ambassadors and people now speaking out on it. So I think you know, for for kids today or even just generations younger than me, they’re becoming their awareness of of fertility and the entire process and the education behind it is a lot stronger than it was even just for myself about just under a decade ago.

P: Okay, that makes sense. It that is frustrating though, and it is hard if you’re I mean not that it would have been a snap if he’d gone to medical people but that is that’s its own separate ride but it is I can imagine very frustrating if it’s just you and your partner and we can’t figure out what’s going on.

M : Absolutely. You know, and then it’s it’s, it’s always you feel like it’s you would always feel it’s the woman who’s who’s who’s the problem and you know your partner feel would or maybe not always but at least in my situation, I think we both kind of felt like oh, something’s wrong with me because I’m not the one getting pregnant. Right? Versus what we’re starting to learn now is you know, it really does take two people to make a baby and, and nothing that it was or wasn’t but you know, it just, it put a lot of the heavy emotions I think on me throughout that whole process, where a partner just made it more of like an impatient waiting game.

P: Yeah. You know, I interviewed a reproductive endocrinologist and she herself use IVF. And we were talking about if you go the IVF route, which I have no personal experience of so she’s educating me on it. They can look at the embryo immediately and look at it. As it grows from one cell, the T cells to three cells or whatever. And I was saying to her, Do you think there’s going to be a time where we can examine that embryo so meticulously that we can say, Yep, this is going to work. This embryo was perfect. And she said, No, because she’s an even if you know that you still have the uterus, you still have all the moms chemistry. There’s so complicated and there’s so many things going on, which is one thing that makes it hard to identify what’s wrong if something’s wrong, and hard to get pregnant, because it’s just there’s so many variables none of what you control.

M: Yeah. It’s so amazing. It’s so amazing how complex it is. And, you know, this is something from the dawn of time that that humans have done you know, it’s so it’s just amazing to hear all that you know, and how far even just the sciences and that we can’t still predict that kind of like we have a success, right?

P: There’s just so much we don’t know, right in this in this realm that it’s, you know, I don’t know what to somebody agree, I would think it’d be much easier if we could say, oh, it’s Bernie’s fault. Okay, I have no idea right? It’s, anyway, so you get pregnant and the first pregnancy. What’s that one? Like?

M: Amazing, honestly, like, it was, it was just, it was I wanted it in my head perfect. It was. At first the only thing I struggled with was that you know, I couldn’t vote because I’ve wanted it so badly for so long. That I didn’t believe it was real. And then I got incredibly incredibly nauseous in my first trimester. 24/7 and I was like, You know what, this is it. This is great. This is like my, my son and I embrace this because this is telling me that okay, I’m actually pregnant and now as I did that, it was really like textbook. Easy, simple. I felt great the entire time. My water broke two weeks early. I had a vaginal birth and and everything was really it was really great. It was a really easy good pregnancy.

P: That’s awesome. And the one thing I will say about the first trimester is there is this weird dissonance where you’re like so much has changed. And it’s there’s no physical evidence that you can see, unless you’re really sick, in which case you you know, it’s like a confirmation to yourself that something’s

M: happening. It seems like a it’s a very strange, you know, it’s a very strange symptom that like, you don’t want it. But in my case, I really wanted it because I Yeah,

P: yeah. I can totally relate to that. I can totally relate to it after the fact why you would have wanted it but I’m sure when you’re in it. It’s like a little bit miserable. No, I

M: honestly like I was but I was like no, this is good. This is good. I needed it. I needed it because I needed to. I needed to start to feel it. I needed after like that wanting it for so long. I actually did it as strange as that sounds and that was the same and that carried for for my other two following that I would almost wait for and I’m like, please, please bring on that now as you know that like it’s this is real. And it’s you know, because you can’t just look at it test. So but so my first pregnancy it was really it was really great. So, you know, I came into it that this is something I want more than anything and I had a great pregnancy and our family plan like we really wanted three children and you know after one I couldn’t be couldn’t be more love couldn’t couldn’t be more in love. I had a boy and he he was just teaching transform my insurance for my life. And after that my second pregnancy was it was health wise. There were some little like scares but everything turned out okay in the end, so I would say it was a pretty good pregnancy otherwise, my hormones were the only thing that were awful. I truly, I truly had no control over my hormones, which is something I didn’t experience my first pregnancy and like I really didn’t like myself that way

P:. How was that? How did you experience that? Was that when your hormones were right. I was so short tempered.

M: I was yelling all the time. And I was rude. I was I was like the worst version of myself.

P It sounds like There’s like there were like mood effects.

M : Yeah, yeah, all mood and I really I didn’t feel like myself. Like when I spoke when I talked and how I acted to people acted around people and treated people. And I couldn’t I couldn’t find it. I couldn’t find it. You know, it was one of those that you lie in bed after and you’re just like, who am I? Who am I? But I had no clue what was going on. I didn’t even know pregnancy could call this like I had no previous education that like, I mean, I knew something’s gonna happen, but I didn’t know I didn’t read I didn’t know anything that pregnancy could cause such a shift and change, like my hormones to to, you know, cause these sorts of reactions for me all I knew is that I really for the 910 months or whatever it was really didn’t like myself at all.

P: Did you talk to your doctor about that? Or like, oh, wow, we know how do we know now that it was hormones? Like we’re

M: because there’s there’s higher education? No, I know. I know. I know. I wish I did. I didn’t I It never occurred to me to talk to my doctor. And you know, one of the reasons which we’ll get into later is that it my dad tried to harass me I was I never knew anything was about me. It was all about the baby. So it had nothing to do with how I was doing. It was just weak. I’d go to my go to chat with my doctor and it’s How’s baby how’s the growth and development of baby? I am that’s all it’s nothing more than that. So it was it didn’t I was never asked and I never thought that I should be asking or seeking support or it kind of just like was the way it was in my head. Okay,

P: so let me ask a question about that. So so the context explaining like, what the relationship was with your doctor makes total sense. Now I can understand why you didn’t bring it to your doctor. But you clearly because you’re lying in bed questioning like what’s going on? I don’t feel like myself. You notice that something was different. You just thought I’m different now or like what did you think at the time?

M : I just kind of bucket it in like well, just the way it is like this is pregnancy like, you know, like, I don’t know, like I’m just like, I don’t know, I really I I don’t have I don’t have a an answer that that I can really like put my finger on it. Like I just I just didn’t I just kind of sucked it up. Like for whatever it didn’t question myself. If that makes sense. I just It just happened. Like I question myself. Until after.

P: Yeah. Because Because after a breaks right, it goes away.

M : Yeah. And you know, I started to feel myself again, you know, it’s like I went through this like really dark hole and a new was happening, but I couldn’t I wasn’t conscious enough to question even myself and to seek help. Or ask if this is normal, or even among friends or anything. I never I never I never got to the point. I just kind of live with it

P : Well, and to be fair to you, you have a toddler and you’re pregnant. So you’re busy, right? You’re focused on other things. Yeah. So do you feel better at the birth or months later or

M: at the birth? Yeah, it was right after the birth. I started Yeah, I just myself, like not not fooling myself. But I think I had more. I should say not myself, but I had more control over the things I said and the way I reacted to things and how I treated people

P : do you reflect on that now and think that was some kind of Peri Partum Depression?

M: I don’t know how to. It was something I don’t intend to put that title like towards it. It was absolutely something. I don’t know what.

P: Yeah, yeah, you’re right. I mean, it sounds it just sounds pretty distinct. Especially since you know, it’s easier to reflect on that where you’re out of it. So I’m glad you got out of it. And how far apart are your kids?

M Do you say? They’re two years apart? Two years Exactly. Two years and two days.

P Oh wow…So birthdays in the same season? It sounds like two days apart to the third pregnancy offers something different entirely or

M : their pregnancy was in an exact reflection like first. Okay. Easy, simple, beautiful. I felt amazing. The whole time just kind of went through the process. And it was it was it was great. I had my daughter in June of 2020. So right after the onset of COVID Wow. And that that made it for a little bit. Interesting experience, of course, being that my partner couldn’t be there for he was there for the birth but immediately kicked out of the hospital. Right after I got off that birthing table. And that that was interesting for me because I was really okay with it before. It’s like, you know what, we, this is our third you’ve been there before. I know what it’s like I know it. I know what I’m going into. My pregnancy has been really easy up to this point. And you know, it’s for me to stay in the hospital for 24 hours. You know, I don’t need you I’ll be okay. And when they kicked him out, essentially before moving me to the maternity floor, I the pain me I can cry to this day thinking about it. That separation was horrible. It was horrible. It’s like a very strange, I don’t know, feeling similar to like, loneliness but he is telling it’s just like ripped away from you. And you just you just birth the child together and to not have them be in there, though that was only hard, challenging part of it. But the rest of the pregnancy itself was again it was very lucky that it was very similar to my first and really easy and I was really happy throughout the whole time.

P: That’s great. Wow, that sounds like outside of the birth experience that sounds like you know, the best possible the best possible experience you could have especially given COVID

M: Yeah, it was it was and it’s really interesting like why I’m here today and like what my like new mission in life is and it’s all it’s all a really, I think, like larger reflection on the whole process of everything that was going to while I say I had beautiful pregnancies, there was so much going on, but I’m I’m still struggling to get through that I didn’t realize while I was in it, even even though things were so, so great. And I really felt so great. But there’s there’s a lot that I’m still dealing with now that really started from from my first pregnancy.

P : So let’s talk about that. It sounds it sounds a little bit like what you’re saying is that motherhood is not what you thought it would be.

M: It motherhood. Motherhood is incredible. I absolutely adore my children. I absolutely adore being a mother. What’s hard is is losing yourself in the process. So I knew identify in to most of society, my friends, my family, I identify as mother, but not but not Marnie. So while I gained this absolutely beautiful life, I lost myself. And that’s where I didn’t realize why that was happening until very recently. So my youngest is almost two and it took like, till she was about a year for me to realize this. So this is about six years, six, seven years in this process where I feel like Hey, I I’m I’m not me, I’m I’m just a mom. Like I’m that that’s that’s that’s when people see me that’s how I see myself that’s, you know, how my partner sees me my colleagues, but there’s no money in that. And that that’s, that’s been a big focus of mine, I would say in the past. In the past year and a half to understand that and to change that.

P: So let’s talk about the you before the kid that was a person who was focused on career it sounds like yeah, it’s very clear.

M: Very, so. Very, yeah, just very, I think like, focus all around like very, very self identify, like totally new, but I was really glad to I was I had lots of interesting hobbies. I was definitely very, very career focused, but also very socially focused.

P: And motherhood displaced them both. Absolutely. So what what you’re struggling with is the loss of this former self and trying to figure out how to regain it or how to reshape it or

M: Yeah, I think it’s how to, we don’t need to be just one. I don’t need to be just a mom. I can still be I can identify I can have a lot of identities, you know, and being a mother is one of them. You know, being being a wife as well and a sister as one a friend is one a colleague is one, you know, so I think that people can have multiple identities, but oftentimes what happens is when you become a mom that almost becomes your leading identity. And what you need is to keep your core identity and realize that that is one part and it can be strong and amazing. And it can mean the absolute absolute world to you. But not at the sacrifice of losing like who you are. You as like the person.

P: Yeah, totally agreed. So So where are you on this journey?

M: So you know The first is like, the first step was, I think, just understanding it and and kind of going back in time and where we’re lost myself and trying to re identify who I was and what was important to me and what was I really passionate about enjoyed doing in thinking and, and where I am today is I feel like I’m in a I’m in a good place. I mean, I don’t know how to describe it otherwise, but I’m very conscious of not letting myself or others like my identity as a mother kind of take over everything else. And trying to like when my friends call me like they’re like Hey Mama, and I’m like, no, no, my name is Marni like I really just like the the mama culture. You know people who wear this like and I’m this is just me and I think it’s great for other people but because they’re so proud and they shouldn’t be proud to be mothers but for me, it’s pushing people around me to be like, okay, me first like I am person outside, outside of my children. You know, if you’re gonna give me a gift for my birthday, it doesn’t have to be like a necklace with all my children’s initials. Like, there’s something maybe for me too, as like a small example.

P: So why don’t you tell us about the company that you started?

M : Yeah, so the company’s rumbly and rumley started on this notion that women are not the priority in pregnancy. And they’re seen and treated through culture and our medical system as as merely vessels and the the market is saturated with maternal and baby products and nothing is really focused on the woman and the emotional journey that she’s on. You know, fertility has changed and postpartum has changed yet pregnancy has remained the same. So rumbly is is a brand that is to prioritize women’s health and experience and support them on this emotional journey, not just the physical journey. And it’s really to set them up for better outcomes after baby after baby arrives. At launch from these going to launch with a pregnancy subscription box, where half the items in every box are for the woman you are and the other half are for the mom you’re becoming and there’s three core goals with the subscription box and that’s just spoil and shower mom with gifts and that’s really to help celebrate every month every month is a milestone and and the reason to, to celebrate with items that are focused just on her. It’s also there to help prioritize herself again in pregnancy to help her not lose herself in the process, and then make the transition to motherhood a little less overwhelming because it’s extremely overwhelming. But also a little bit more fun. And again with the ultimate goal of setting her up for a better outcome and the end. So as a brand that I hope that women do see rumbly is more than a subscription box. It’s just a it’s a new way to experience pregnancy and to treat it really it’s as it’s a tool to help her in that journey. And the goal is to share more realness, more love support throughout the entire journeys. That’s when that positive test and then eventually going into her experience after delivery. And the aim to be a source of more truth and emotional support and ultimately women’s biggest cheerleaders

P: That sounds awesome like give us a sense of like what’s in the first month box

M: because women Some women find out a very different times when they’re actually pregnant. Instead of doing monthly the first box is is covers the first trimester. So months 123 in there I have a couple of branded items. So one of them I have a I have a calendar, a custom calendar flip calendar that we created every week it has either prompts or some insights into things that are going on some things to make you smile to make you laugh different things for the week. It’s kind of like a rumbly take on you know any of the apps you get like with the fruits like babies the size of this, it goes a little deeper in that but again like weekly kind of what’s going on and it’s a flip chart and it’s beautifully branded as something that you put on your desk to keep track of it. Of your pregnancy. Another item in there is a AEV have a felt folder and it’s your go to pregnancy organizer I found when I was pregnancy I got tons of papers and products and ultrasound pictures and it’s kind of one folder that you can keep everything in. I was kind of putting things all over the place. There’s a bracelet it’s a gold bangle that has two parts and it’s a beautiful piece of jewelry and it’s to help women just feel good. You know jewelry puts for many women a smile on their face and feel nice and the double hearts very symbolic of you know, you know, have another heart beating inside you so you kind of have two hearts at once. There’s a water bottle to encourage obviously hydration drink a lot. There’s a lip balm, there’s some vegan organic mint gum, there’s a a felt letter board where you can put like for pregnancy announcements or you can track your growth or whatever you want any input some personal like self love or any kind of your own custom messages on the board. And that that rocks up everything in that first box. So there’s seven items in there. And those again, are really kind of being in thought of what’s going on for you just in that first trimester. while also being a little bit more general to women’s experience. During that time. Of course everyone will have a very different first trimester but initially at launch, we’re trying to to appeal to the most common experiences that women have during that time.

P: This is cool, and it’s such a cool idea. It’s interesting to me that that is your experience in Canada because, you know, as someone who lives in the US, I think of Canada as our more rational cousin. So I would have imagined that the experience of being pregnant there would be different and somewhat better. If you’re being you’re in Toronto, like you’re in one of the major cities. So that’s your best shot and having experience with with the medical team where it’s more holistic.

M: Yeah, it’s, you know, it’s it’s very not the case and I think maybe it’s because of our healthcare system. we get to get two ultrasounds, Three reasons It’s a very process. One of the biggest things that every box is so their products and those products to support you in your journey.

October 28, 2022October 28, 2022

Episode 70: Losing your Identity in Motherhood: Marnie’s story

May 13, 2022May 13, 2022

Episode 51 SN: Race, Identity & Motherhood: Naomi’s story

Today’s guest, like many of us, encountered some unexpected twists and turns at the delivery that were challenging to manage in the moment. But the focus of the story she shares today is about race and identity–she gives us a sense of what it’s like to live in the world both as a daughter who doesn’t resemble her father, and as a mother who doesn’t superficially look like her son…what assumptions people make and share and what these assumptions suggest about how we define motherhood.

You can find Strength of Soul, here

More of Naomi’s work: The Hidden Curriculum and Rethinking Race in the United States

Audio Transcript

Paulette: Hi welcome to war stories from the womb

I’m your host Paulette Kamenecka. I’m an economist and a writer and the mother of two girls.

Let’s get to her inspiring story

Hi, thanks so much for coming on the show. Can you introduce yourself and tell us where you’re from?

Naomi: Absolutely. Thank you, Paulette, for having me. My name is Naomi Rachel Enright and I am based in Brooklyn, New York.

P: Oh, wow. That’s lucky. Brooklyn’s like the place to be.

N: It’s a pretty cool place. I must say. I do love it. I love it. My son is being raised here was born here too. I do love it. And I love New York in general. Like I grew up in New York, in Brooklyn and the Bronx, actually, I went to high school in Manhattan. So I am a New Yorker through and through for sure.

P: Wow. So we’re here to talk about family so before we’re talking about the family you created let’s talk about the family you came from.

N: Okay.

P: So why don’t you tell us Do you have any siblings?

N: I do. I have one older brother. His name is Nikki and he is six and a half years older than me and also lives in New York. So that’s that we’re both still here. Yeah. And so

P: you have kind of an interesting story of your family moving here. Why don’t you tell us a little bit about that? Because I want to get a sense of whether the context you came from affected the context you thought you wanted.

N: Oh, wow. Okay. Yeah, no, that’s a great question. So I was raised in New York, as I said, but I was born in the La Paz Bolivia by chance actually, my father had a job there for two years. And so I was born there and spent the first 10 months of my life there and I am, ability and citizen but my origins are Jewish American on my father’s side. My paternal grandfather came to Ellis Island in 1910, from Russia. And my paternal grandmother was the daughter of Lithuanian immigrants. I mean, I think, you know, sort of the borders have changed over the course of time and so I’m sure maybe that you know, it’s like modern day Poland. What do I know but Eastern European, and my mother is from Guiaquil Ecuador, and did not come to this country until age 19. She came here on a scholarship at Tulane University. So she left at age 19 for that. And my father, my mother met through the Peace Corps. Actually, my father was a Peace Corps volunteer. He was teaching English and he was teaching English in Guiaquil, and my mother was one of his students. And so that’s how they met and fell in love. And were married for 44 years, I suppose. And my brother actually was born in Guiaquil. They had thought they would live in Ecuador. They were there for a few years before my brother was born. And then they came about the time they left Bolivia so he was about 10. months, I think as well. And then my mother jokes that she’s like a salmon because the salmon returns to its birthplace right to have its children. She wanted us born if not in Ecuador than in South America. But looking by birth, yeah, she was like this will do. So that’s my origins, you know, sort of ethnic, you know, familial origins, or

P: I know from your book that having an American father and Ecuadorian mother those two backgrounds together, played an important role in your life, and we’ll get into that. But on a more basic level, did you know that you would want a child? Did you think I’m going to have a family?

N: Yes, it’s funny that you asked that because when I was expecting my son, and I’m the mother of one child, in his first almost year of life my father was we told me that I had been preparing for motherhood since I was about five he would joke because I did I always wanted to have children. I always thought a lot about becoming a mother, wanting children how I would raise them. I used to in fact as a little girl, I would name my kids so I have these list of things for my future unborn children. So it was definitely a want of mine, you know, a desire of mine. And I think that you know, there was some truth with my father said it wasn’t a preparation, a lifelong and I’m also an educator. And so I work with children of all ages for many, many years, you know, nearly 20 years and I have a way with kids I relate very well to children, and I relate well to actually a wide range of ages…I always had some younger cousins I would take care of and use or pretend they were my babies. I have a, my youngest first cousin, I actually named him and so, you know, I felt this real, you know, sort of very connected to him. I always joke that he was my first baby, which my son does not like he’s like, actually, I’m your first baby and your only baby. So yeah, so motherhood was definitely something I wished for. And I’m very, very lucky and happy that that I achieved it. I am a mom.

(4:45) &P: Yeah, amazing. So before you got pregnant, what did you imagine pregnancy to be like?

N: Wow. It’s funny, you know, because I think that a part of me always thought of pregnancy sort of in the abstract, and I did not think of what the reality of being pregnant and and bringing a child for a lifeforce would, would be like. I remember clearly sort of the first inkling that I was pregnant, and I had, you know, sort of cramping that was out of the timeline of when I would be having cramping. And I remember thinking, Wait a second. That’s strange, right. And I had actually been my parents also sitting over there for some reason. And so the next morning I texted my husband, I said, you know, I had this strange cramping and it woke me up in the middle the night and he said he instantly thought she’s pregnant and he was like, she’s definitely pregnant. So he had the first inkling that I was, despite my having the physical sensation, he, he was really convinced that that was the, the, you know, my our child or future child making his presence known.

P: And that’s a testament to your abstract notion of pregnancy,

N: I guess. Exactly. That was like, I don’t know what that is. But But yeah, and so then it was confirmed within I guess, about two weeks from that. And my pregnancy itself was quite healthy and easy. I remember my hair looked great. I felt really great. So I would say my son was good for my curls when I was pregnant. And I was thrilled and excited. But as the pregnancy became closer and closer to the actual birth story, I remember feeling very nervous and very scared and you know, sort of this realization that you know, this is not abstract anymore. You know, this is going to happen, I’m going to give birth to a human being and I was terrified. And I ended up having a very, you know, not really complicated but it was it was a tough story because I went into labor

P: let’s go slowly here. Yeah. So tell us how how are we know today’s the day that you’re gonna go into labor like what what happens that day?

N: Well, that’s funny. Yeah, that’s part of sort of, you know, you know, the best laid plans, right. I remember packing my bag for the hospital and, you know, having it ready for whatever, two weeks or so in advance of my due date. My due date was November 24 2010. And so I had it packed and I had my novel, I had my lollipops, you know, I was like, Oh, this would be great. Thinking I was going to like to have some resort. And I remember that on was it it would have been I actually tried to have labor pains on the 24th. And so on the due date, and it looked like I might go into labor. And my husband, it was all like, you know, ready to he was like, alright, you know, we’re gonna go and we call the doctor and then it stopped. And so, you know, it’s an essence post labor and I was deeply distressed by that. I remember I was very upset because I had felt like oh, you know, this is it. You know, we’re ready. We’re gonna go we’re gonna have his kid. And it was not to be and I remember I texted uh, one of my best friends was pregnant as well and expecting very close to my date as well. And I told her and I was like off I’m so annoyed, right this this kid does not want to get out. And she said, we looked that way. It looks like he wants to see in the belly and you know he was expecting a boy. And I said, as long as he’s not past December 1, I was like, You better be born at least within a week. I said, and so you know, that week went by and that Monday before the first time where I had acupuncture, you know, sort of like get things rolling. And then that Tuesday the 30th it really started to get in motion and surgical contraction in this sort of thing out this is really going to happen you’d like we’re close you know maybe was even the mountain the night actually Monday night it was Tuesday went to the doctor you know as waddling along could barely walk, you know, huge It was huge. And I’m a fairly small statue you know, I’m not even five three and I had this huge belly and I was for waddling along and in a lot of pain I remember I love sciatic pain because of the weights and so my back hurt and I couldn’t walk I was so so uncomfortable. And went to the doctor and they said you know I think your close so you can go to the hospital and so are they actually said you can go like have a like a bite and then go to the hospital. And my doctor was of course in a realm of you know, in the neighborhood of doctor or you know, as my son was born in what was then Brooklyn Methodist Hospital, and my doctor was just about two blocks away from there. And then we went up to some diner and my in laws were in town and so my in laws and my husband and I went to have to food sort of you know, it was like, let’s have food and see what happens, you know, then we’ll take her in and sort of leisurely to the hospital. And I couldn’t hold on the food and I was not well and they all were like you know what, I think we just need to go to the hospital. We walked the block and a half or so that it was to the hospital. And I remember I remember sort of the you know, the wailing and the pain and really immediately asking for an epidural and I had I had not what I would want one I have I had totally the whole pregnancy tradition which is natural law. You know, I can do this, you know, women, you hear me roar. And

P: I hear some Brooklyn in there,

N: did you but all of that went out the window. Right? As soon as it really came you know the pain was there and the contractions and the reality was setting in what was to come I immediately was like, give me all the drugs. And of course, you don’t get that right away. And so I had to wait to whatnot. But I remember when they gave me the the epidural and I remember immediately calming down and being like, Oh, this is a really nice room. We’re gonna get the show on the road. So it’s a very funny switch of energy and behavior. And we really thought that it would come you know, fairly soon right that I would have like contractions I would dilate and I would give birth and we’d have this baby in our arms and be shorter lives as parents and as a family of three. But oh, that actually was not the case and I dilated to eight centimeters and I ended up I remember they had to give me I was GBS positive, I remember.

P: Yeah.

N: And I remember that when I for that I needed to be given antibiotics, right so they wouldn’t affect the baby. And I developed a fever from the antibiotics. It’s so funny to be remembering all this right? Because it’s so so long ago really in this way it was over a decade ago. But it’s so vivid, right? It’s like I remembered as if it were yesterday. I tried to use the case ready for any transformative experience. And so I did I developed a fever, and there was a horrible, horrible storm. I remember that night there was this rainstorm, and the wind was howling and there was the rain was hitting the window. And I have all these very vivid memories of the contraction and so looking at the different points in the room. I had my different points there. I’m of the doctor and my husband everybody told me to focus on as the contractions came. And I remember one of those points was the window and so I would see the rain and I would see the branches and it looked very ominous, frankly, you know, look very scary to me. And I was like This is terrifying. Like I don’t know what is about to happen and I’m so nervous.

P: I’m not sure you want to give birth on a dark and stormy night.

N: Exactly. I was like this is not making me feel good. And of course with a fever you feel awful anyway, right? Like I had the muscle aches. I mean, it was just awful. And I don’t know my doctor I loved loved, loved my doctor, you know, I felt like he was almost like an uncle. You know, he just adored him. And he was so kind to me and so good to me. And he was a jokester a little bit, you know, they’re a funny and this is with him, you know who make me laugh and he was very funny and light hearted and warm. And so I had this very comfortable rapport with him. And I remember he said to me, you know, Naomi, I think that you’re gonna have to have a C section. And I thought he was kidding, because he’d always been funny, right? So I started to laugh. And he was completely the most serious I’ve ever seen him and he said, No, Naomi, I’m serious. It’s like we have to get this baby out, and you’re not dilating and you’re feverish, and you’re delirious because I had barely slept. And so he’s like, you’re gonna have to have a C section. And I was very upset by that, because I had always throughout the pregnancy said as long as it’s not a C section, I don’t want a C section. And so I was deeply distressed to realize that I would, in fact be giving birth via C Section.

P: Some people have overlaid feelings about the C section beyond that it’s a surgery and that there’s recovery, but that it means something about the birth. Is there any of that going on or you just don’t

N: that was 100% What was going on? For me it felt like then I hadn’t done my job I hadn’t followed through a you know, as like the woman who gives birth vaginally and I was just very upset. You know, I felt kind of like, but that’s not what I’m supposed to do. Right? I’m supposed to give birth vaginally and I’m very upset by this. So it was entirely about the narrative of what is the quote unquote, right way to give birth.

So yeah, so that’s what it was. And of course, I was frightened of the surgery. I was and knowing that the recovery would be alongside caring for a newborn. So that was there. But I would say the overriding feeling was certainly you know, sort of that societal narrative and societal pressure of the right or wrong way to to give birth or to have a child period right to become a mother and so yeah, and so I remember I was very upset by it, and he had to really calm me, you know, they were like, listen, like you need to, you know, like you need to get this baby out and we need you to be in a good place as well right for you physically as as well as emotionally. And so you know, eventually was like, Okay, right, I guess this is this is how I’m gonna give birth right?

And I remember, you know, wheeling me into the room preparing the whole scene, the curtain ray in front of me and my husband has scrubs and of course, my husband hadn’t slept at all either, you know, he was delirious as well. Not feverish, but he was delirious and about to become a father and so for him was also you know, this is a latch, right, and we’re not even parents yet. And I remember in the operating room, being very cognizant of not seeing what was happening, and being very frustrated by that, you know, so very sort of divorced from my own birth story. You know, I sort of felt like am I even here, right? Because the curtain was in front of me, and I couldn’t see anything. And I could only make out certain things either by what I saw or what I heard more of what I heard them saw.

P: let me ask you a question about that. So I see section two before they put up a curtain I was like, You’re not gonna make me watch right. I don’t want to. I don’t want to see the woman sawed in half. That’s, that’s not my game. But people have said that they sometimes surgeons allowed like to have a mirror on the other side so you can see what’s happening. I wonder if that was an option for you or

N: no, that was never brought up that was never offered and I don’t think I would have necessarily wanted that per se. For me, it was more about not seeing the action of the doctor, you know, and the nurses and my husband, you know, that was more of the frustrating part to me. You know, I felt sort of alone despite having all these people surrounding me. And that bothered me, right and I remember when they finally did get my son out and I heard his cries. I said, my baby, my baby, that’s my baby. I want to see my baby. And I had to wait, you know, because of course, you know, they have to cut the cord and you do the weight and all that stuff. And so it felt to me like a lifetime. I was like, I hear this baby who I’ve been trying for the last 41 weeks, and I want that baby. I was like, give me the baby. And I couldn’t hold him of course, right? Because it’s a C section. And so my husband, he brought him you know, all wrapped up and clean. And I kissed him and I remember thinking he was the most gorgeous thing I’d ever laid eyes on that he was just precious precious. And I was then wheeled away which right I had to go to the recovery room. And that also was upsetting. I was like so I just kissed this baby who is in a world now thanks to my body and my husband, you know, and I’m not happy that I can’t be with him. And I’ll never forget that as they were really getting out. There were nurses wheeling, of course, right the gurney and they were having a conversation. But at one point I thought they were talking to me and they said to me like how are you? And I started to answer and then within moments I realized they weren’t talking to me I was like I’m actually not really here. Like no one’s talking to me was also sort of, you know, this kind of alienating isolating experience and in the recovery room. The first person I talked to on the phone beside of course. My husband of course, who was in the room with me was my cousin and my cousin is my first cousin. He’s the son of my mom’s sister, my aunt, and we grew up together. And I consider my brother, right for me I really feel that I have two older brothers and I adore him and so I always remember that he was the first person I got to talk to after becoming a mom and for him who is my older brother in essence right and has seen me grow up for him. He says you know, I can’t believe my little cousin’s a mom and remember, he was like, that’s crazy. So you know that that conversation sort of sense you know that wow life is really about to change, like it has changed. It’s about to become very different. And so I was in there and I couldn’t have water I had to do is chew my ice cubes which also aggravated me I was like I am thirsty. Like I want water and my baby. And I don’t know how many hours later it was you my son was born I think at 1:36pm and I didn’t see him till I guess like 730 or eight o’clock at night, something like that.

P: wow

N: Maybe it was early and it was like 630 but it was you know significant chunk of time. And they’re you know when I finally got to see him and hold him in the room was just phenomenal. And my husband were watching the video and I said to him in my arms I said you grew nice and strong in there because he grew he was eight pounds and 21 inches you know he was he was a very sturdy he was a strong baby’s born with muscle you know, it’s like you were like doing like push ups or something because he was so strong and so healthy. And so Did you know In retrospect, of course it took many years to come to peace with this but I in retrospect it was absolutely right call for me to have that C section. But it was a very hard way to to become a mom and to then navigate feels initial days and weeks and even months, perhaps even years of motherhood.

Yeah,

P: I have to say we have some similarities in our story. We both had C sections. Yeah. And a lot of the things that you described, I’ve never focused on in my own story, and you’re totally right. All that stuff is really alienating and it’s so weird to be wheeled to the recovery room. Just like you after the C section I was alone, but everything that unfolded after your C section is strange. I understand that the nurses can talk to their colleagues during work. But it’s strange to have that conversation literally right over you and ignore you in the process.

N: precisely

P: the lack of interaction sounds industrial, really just contrary to the spirit of what you’d expect after birth. Why was there such a long period before you got to eight your son?

N: I’m not sure I have a feeling perhaps had to do with having been ill right having had a fever and not having slept and maybe they thought they right from time.

P: that makes sense

N: But it was a it was like I’m not going to sleep like Are you joking, right? I was like I still want to see my baby. So that’s not going to happen, right? I didn’t sleep at all. You know, all I did was talk to my cousin and sort of you know, count the hours until I got to see and hold my child but I think that was the thinking the thinking was you know this woman needs to rest on before we really thrust her into the the ring.

P: for so many women that that last piece does not happen. It doesn’t people don’t dilate. Fully. Exactly. What would you do? Right?

N: Exactly. No, it’s that’s actually a really good point. Because I remember you know, my family saying to me, and you know me if this had been another time or another context, there you or your son would have been in danger, right? I mean, and that really also helped me to come to peace with with a C section as well. But I remember even people you know, even people initially in those first couple of weeks and whatnot, you know, saying like telling you their own birth stories in a way that I was like, I’m not really interested in your story right now. Right because I just went through it yesterday. Right? And it was traumatic on a number of levels. And I remember that upsetting me, right that people should be like, Oh, for me, it was so simply and I went in and I went out I had a baby. And I was like awesome for you. Right? Bully for you. Right? Because that’s just not what you say to, in my opinion to to any woman who’s just given birth like it’s actually about your story. It’s not right. It’s like in that moment, it is that mother and her baby and and that journey that they took to reach that point. And and so that was also upsetting to me in those first couple of weeks. I had more than one person you know, and I get it to I get like we want to reminisce you remember, especially now right now that’s years later like it, it’s so vivid, I get it right. I get that, you know, this is a transform experience that all parents remember and want to share and share. But I think you know, timing is everything. And so that was rough too. Yeah,

P: I agree. I do think it’s like traveling to a place that people who haven’t been there, just have no idea what it looks and feels like. That’s right. It’s just it’s a really hard thing to translate into language just like just like the pain of delivery, right? Like you imagined like, you know, I’ve hurt myself before and I’ve toughed it out like this is a pain that kind of defies defies analogy, right? It’s not like anything else. So it’s really hard to kind of get there.

P: Now that we’ve heard about your experience, I’d like to talk about how you’ve written about your experience. I don’t know if you’ve written more than one book, but you’ve written strength and soul. Is that the name of the book? That’s probably my one and only look at, which is super interesting. Take on your well, maybe I’ll let you describe it. So can you describe it?

N: Sure. Yes. So So interestingly, so you know, I describe my ethnic background, right Jewish father and Ecuadorian mother, and And so growing up there were lots of questions about like, my family, a lot of assumptions made a lot of othering you know, is that your real dad? Are you adopted, you don’t look like him this kind of thing. And so I was grew up with this way of people sort of making an oddity out of my family. And it’s always it was something that I think sparked a lifelong interest in examining identity and and racism and understanding the ways that we conceptualize of ourselves and of the world around us, and of history, and the assumptions we make and how that’s connected to to systemic racism.

P: So when we start, let me stop you there for a second because this is totally relevant to your story. So I read that beginning piece of your book about people asking you on the playground is that your dad when he comes up to you and how people treated you differently when it was just your dad and you and your brother versus all of you? Yeah, and I’m wondering how that I mean, that lives in your head. So how does that affect your thinking about I’m going to start my own family?

N: That’s a really great question. It’s interesting because my husband is white. My husband is of Irish and German origin. Grew up in the Midwest grew up in Ohio. And when I you know, when he and I became serious, and you know, certainly after we were engaged in married, and planning a family, letting a child let’s just say because we were already family, I had more than one person for sure. There were my father’s saying, you know, if you have a kid or kids, they’ll more than likely look white, right because adults my husband is white, and you are largely European in your heritage, right, and your ancestry. I mean, I’m brown skin, but I’m got a lot of European running through my veins. And so there was sort of this, you know, sort of this question, you know, what would this kid look like, you know, what would our kids or kid look like? And I remember when I was pregnant, thinking, like this, these can be light skinned, like there’s no denying in my head, and more than likely this child will be light skinned. So it’s really prepared for that possibility and more than like pure reality. And I remember once having a dream a very vivid dream, not too long before giving birth around the summer, I don’t know. And it was a sort of a golden skinned baby with, like, sort of caramel eyes and like, just very golden hair, you know, and I remember thinking, the urge, you know, maybe like that kind of maybe it’s my baby like, maybe that’s gonna look like my kid. And the truth is, I wasn’t far off because my son completely looks completely white American. There’s no one who would ever look at my son and think that he’s a brown skinned mother, and an even darker skinned grandmother and dark skinned biological family members.

No one would ever think it and so as soon as he was born, I looked at him I was like, wow, really? This kid is way lighter than even I expected. Right? I was like, I was kind of prepared for me to be light skinned, but this light skinned you know, I mean, he looked completely white. And I remember thinking even in the hospital room, like hmm, you know, it’s gonna be interesting right to be in the world with him. A little did I know just how interesting and how challenging and exhausting frankly, it would be right to navigate motherhood with a child that most people do not associate with me. And many people discard me as he’s not afraid to discard the possibility that I could be his his mother. And that was very painful for me. Because growing up it was hard. You know, I hated when people ask me those questions. I my brother, in fact, looks just like our father. I mean, I used to joke that my brother was our father dipped in milk chocolate. It’s my father’s face. Like he is my father’s you know sort of doppelganger, really, and I look less physically like my dad, but I certainly have shared physical traits of my father. And what made it even more challenging, sadly, is that my father right to my white parent, and just falling ill soon after my son was born, you know, he fell ill in January 2011. And I was very convinced it was very serious. And, frankly, the family didn’t really believe me. And they were like, Well, you’re a new mom. You know, you’re not sleeping like you tend to be a very a worrier. I’ve always been a worrier. This is true. And so they kind of thought I was over blowing things, and they were like, oh, Naomi, he’ll be fine. He’s fine.

But I was like knowing that right was like he’s losing weight. He’s not giving him an appetite. This is not the father. I know. Right. My father always been very healthy a good eater, you know, Walker. So I was just deeply, deeply concerned from that point from January 2011. And over the course of that year, which is the course of the first year of my son’s life, my father was dying. He was dying at year and we did not receive confirmation of that until September

P: oh wow

N: September 2000. Let him I thought it was diagnosed with stage four pancreatic cancer which we know is different. Right? And he died November 29 2011. And so the very day a year before that I had gone for acupuncture. I’m beginning to you know, begin the journey of of giving life and having a challenge becoming a mother my father died and left this world and was deeply traumatic, deeply traumatic, because not only was I close to my dad, we were the best of friends, but I lost the connection, the context in essence, the physical context or contextualization, I should say for my son from my side of the family. And so when when I’m out in the world, my mother would think goodness is alive and well. People are just scratching their heads. They’re like, how did this happen? Right because my mother looks to the naked eye people think she’s black American. People look at me and think I’m Latina, or Middle Eastern. Maybe when people look at my son, I think he’s white. And so we are three generations of the same family. And yet, right and so there’s this real fatigue, you know, and being out in the world and even with my husband and son, you know, people often just or I can just tell you, you know, they’re looking back and forth and sort of trying to figure out, you know, what’s the connection here? You know, that’s the mom, you know, I’m gonna people that actually voice these things. It’s not just that I can tell by expression and because I have a lifelong experience with people staring and wondering. They have voiced it you know, I’ve been asked how long I’ve looked after him.

P: Oh, my God.

N: And this is from, you know, when he was relieved, I mean, now it’s different because he is, I’ve raised my son, you know, we’ve raised our son to have a very clear understanding of the way through the assumptions that people will make about us, and how those are always a reflection of their reality. Right? Like, what they know what they want, they think they know, and not of us, which was how I was raised. I was raised to know that the questions people pose to me, were not a reflection of me. And I always felt very empowered by that. And so I think that because of that intentionality, and my parents raising of me and my brother, I was prepared to be my son’s mother. That’s what I always say. I always say to be my parents daughter prepared me to be my son’s mother. Because I was you know, super heavy armor you know, I had the armor to be able to handle the questions you have to handle the the comments, and although you know, I’m not no one is made of of iron, and so it was very painful for me often and it was particularly painful because I didn’t have my dad and so I don’t have my dad. And so it was Yeah, and my son has my father’s eyes. And so that’s another thing that’s interesting is that people are very struck by his eyes. His eyes are really striking they are he has a blue green eyes that change with the light or what he’s wearing. And so they’re really a beautiful shade. And he also it’s interesting, because it has its shape of my mother’s eyes, and so they’re almond shaped. And they’re really striking, right? Because you don’t tend to see that shape without that color. But people always say that, you know, people are like, Oh my God, he’s got the most beautiful eyes. And I have to often be like, yeah, they’re my dad’s eyes, right? And so I’m always sort of reminded of his absence, you know, in those interactions, and people often assume he’s got his dad’s like, oh, he must have his father’s, which is always actually kind of annoyed me.

Because, right the assumption is, there’s no way that can come from you. So when I wrote this, you know, my book is is an examination of the contrast in the assumptions that were made about me with my mother and father, particularly my father, versus the assumptions made about me as a mother. And so as a mother, I’m assumed to be his nanny, his caretaker. And then growing up it was assumed that my father had adopted me. And I think there’s a lot of that’s a loaded, loaded assumptions. Because they are sort of attached to privilege and power and inequity really, right. And so I was just fascinated. I was like, Wait a second, you know, there’s something here right that there’s this huge contrast and was a suit about the same person me in the roles that I hold with these two people, one who gave me life and one whose life I brought forth, right, it was like this is fascinating.

And of course, it also sort of coincided with my lifelong interest in examining these issues. And I’ve also worked in around this all my life, too. I was a language teacher and in my Spanish teacher and in my language classroom, we were talking about identity a lot about culture. And all of this has just been a lifelong passion of mine. And so, you know, then having a child and sort of being given this, the huge responsibility of raising a person which is just in and of itself, a huge responsibility, preparing them for the world, and then visa vie all these issues. And then of course, you know, the wrench of my father’s death, you know, sort of the twists, you know, my father having died so early on in my child’s life, and in my journey as a mother, right, like that was so, so painful for me very traumatic, very traumatic and remains a source of pain for me, you know, I think I will always be sad about it. I will always feel that absence but luckily, because of my, my writing, really, I write a lot about loss as well. And Strength of soul is also born out of that loss as well. And so I feel like you know, language for me has always been a healer. And when I’m able to write about my father and my journey as a mother, I find each and every time it feels like balm for my soul, and it’s also a gift for my son, I feel, you know, I feel like I’m giving my father to my son. My son really sort of has a sense of who he was.

And my son has a sense of who he is right? My son knows that despite how people see him, and the assumptions they make about him, right. People do not think that he’s bilingual. People do not think that his name is pronounced in Spanish. Or of course, they don’t think I’m his mom. He’s so so at this point. He’s 11. Now, you know, he’s just ready to take it all on, right. Like, knows who he is. And I’m feel that that’s totally because of the efforts on my husband and our families parts. And so I feel very proud of that. And I feel sort of empowered by that because it feels to me like you know, the outside exterior is not going to dictate for us, you know, who we are and how we feel basically, in the world.

P: It is a tricky thing that you’re describing. And I can imagine as a child was confusing for people to constantly asked about is this your father, and to question your role as your son’s mother, maybe suggesting that there’s something that’s not right or that doesn’t make sense about a mother who looks like you having a child who looks like your son. Maybe that’s what feels offensive.

N: I mean, I think that we make assumptions as human beings regardless right? And assumptions about everything assumptions about you know, belonging, about family about what language you might speak, you know, where you’re from, etc. And, you know, I feel like that’s just a human quality, right that we’re going to do that sometimes. However, I think there’s a distinction between assuming and acting on the assumption. Right, I That, to me was the fascinating part, particularly as a mom that people would voice these things to me I was like, really, you know, I’m like you like That’s why you should keep to yourself, right? Like, why would you ask that?

P: I’m always thinking, you know, I can hear you say that out loud.

N: Like you said out loud. Exactly, exactly. I mean, the thing is, over the course of my son’s life, I have learned how to handle it so so well, I have to say because initially, I would just get upset, you know, making the anger I would feel hurt. And I would you know, just not want to leave the house. You know, I hated those mom and baby groups. I hated them. Because for me, it was like, you’re all staring at me. Like I have no place here. And I could tell that you’re like, how did that happen? You know, how is she that kid’s mom? And then I’ve only spoken to my son in Spanish in essence since his birth, right and so there’s and that to me, it’s been a godsend. It is protection for me because even though Spanish is not a private language, particularly in New York City, it is our own little sort of secret in a way right? It’s like people do not expect the child to respond to me in Spanish and they certainly don’t expect him to be like mama, blah, blah. Blah, right. And to me that feels like yep, you know, you figure that out rarely let people sort of sit there and you know, sit with that right that makes me feel you know, sort of empowered and and happy. But you know, in the beginning wasn’t like that of course right? When he was pre verbal right when he was pre verbal is like, gosh, right? Like no one knows anything here. He can’t you know, also speak to them. But I have a memory two memories that stand out from when he was quite small. He was about three when I was asked how long I’d been looking after him. I remember I was on a train platform with him and someone asked me, you know, how long have you he’s so cute. How long have you been looking after him? And without missing a beat I said since he was in utero.

P: Oh, that’s a great answer.

N: Thank you. Yes, I was pretty proud of myself. And she kind of blanched it was like, Oh, he’s yours? And said, yep. And she goes, Oh my god, I’m so sorry. You know, I was like, I mean, I guess you know, he’s really looked like you which is not true. He does not look at me look like me. Superficially, I always say, actually, he does not look like me. But for those who look beyond the surface, the child looks a lot like me, and particularly now that he’s older, but he has my lips. He has the shape of my eyes. He has my smile. He’s a lot of my gestures. And so it was like this kid is definitely looks like me, right? But people they just see, you know, his, his light skinned his late eyes and his light hair versus my dark skin, dark eyes and dark hair and they’re like, No way, right?

But I remember she was you know, apologetic and then ended up saying, you know, well, you know, you’re very cute and gratulations and I was like, Thanks, you know, and so ended up being sort of a passive exchange, it could have gone very differently, right. And I was trying to spin those moments to become sort of a learning teachable moment, which to also take psychic energy like that’s a little tiring for me, but I’d rather that then it becomes sort of you know, contentious, but I have another memory where he was not much older. He while he was like four. We’re on the train. And someone was staring at us. And I think sort of gone by that point, even at that tender age, was accustomed to people looking at us. And he was in his little brain trying to, you know, be like, oh, like, what is the big deal? Like, what are you looking at? You know, and I remember, he pointed at me and then look back at the person and said, Mama, and I was like, My job here is done. Like, it felt so, so affirming. To me. I was like this, my child gets it really he gets that people are gonna question I’m going to disbelieve and he’s gonna let them know what time it is. And that was at four right and so now he’s 11. And he’s just, he just knows what’s up, you know, and it makes me feel it makes me feel really good. It does. Because it’s been a hard road

P: what a moment to feel seen right when you’re when your four year old is like schooling the other train riders.

N: Exactly, Mama.

P: That’s amazing. And he’s bilingual.

N: He is he’s a native speaker of both. Yes, he is.

P: I’m So jealous because he so do you still speak to him only in Spanish or nowadays?

N: Well, you It’s funny you asked that because more and more the older she gets, you know for for particularly when it’s all of us together. It’s going to be in English right? But just the other night you know, we were having a conversation all of us you know my husband and I and after it was a dinner agenda generally, you know, the always the three lesson to speak in English but then after dinner I remember I was doing the dishes or whatever. And he started to chat with me again in English. And I said sufficiente Anglais I was like enough English, right? I was like, massive, but I will order Caressa which means like, gives me a headache. And so I told him he was like, switch, right? And so he switched, right so I feel like for my relationship with him for our own dynamic. I prefer it in Spanish right? And I’ll speak to an English in with his daughter, my husband and with other family members or like, you know, with a friend this kind of thing, but the minute I can or we can I want it to be in Spanish. And I think that’s in part because I don’t want him to lose it. You know, I feel that if he’s not using if you will lose it like any other skill. And I also for me, it’s also sort of a the cocoon of it. You know, it feels very safe and warm to me, right? I mean, it was interesting to me because when I was pregnant and expecting my son, I would speak to him in Spanish in utero. And I remember being taken aback by this because I go back and forth seamlessly for me both languages exist in my brain and had my entire life. I was also a Spanish teacher, right? So it’s like these two languages are entirely both minor, right? But all of a sudden, there was something about motherhood or impending motherhood, or Spanish became what I wanted to use. And I realized quickly that it was because my own mother spoke to me in Spanish speaks to me in Spanish, and it’s my language. Of, of comfort, I guess. Right? It’s like it’s my language of comfort in my language of safety and protection. You know, I’m sure I have even some, you know, subconscious memories of being saying you too in Spanish, you know, are you being soothed in Spanish as as a baby and as a toddler and so that was very eye opening for me, you know, to realize like, wow, like this is this language is definitely more significant in that sense. And so I remember you know, I remember when speaking to him and uterine Spanish, my husband saying who are you talking to? And I said, our son

P: in your family where you were raised, your mother spoke Spanish, did your dad speak English?

N: It’s funny. My dad was bilingual. My dad did speak. Both. But in general, yes. In general. My relationship with my father was in English, and my relationship with my mother is in Spanish. And then when we were the four of us, or as my brother got older and left the house and it was the three of us, I would go back and forth, but generally for us, like at dinner time, even if it was for three of us, it would be Spanish actually, because my dad spoke it. My husband does not and so that’s why it’s not Spanish in those moments.

I mean, my husband however, I will say, understands, I’d say like 90 to 95% of what is said. So like whatever I say to Sebastian, he will reiterate, right like your mother just said Go put on your shoes, whatever it is, right. So he understands. And I also always say that that my son would not be bilingual without my husband’s participation. Right. My husband’s agreement, right. My husband could have gotten in the way of it, you know, it could have been like, well, I don’t speak and I don’t want to not understand what my kid is saying, you know, he could have gone there. And he did not right I think he really understood how important was to me in Tripoli, given how the world receives us, right? He knows how that is for us. And I think sometimes it makes him feel saddened and frustrated, right? Because he knows it’s not as quote unquote, easy for me in the world with our son as it is for him. And so I think

P: I’m not sure I would quote unquote.

N: Well, I say up because I say, you know, there’s other ways it’s challenging to be a parent. Right? So it’s like, it’s hard for him in other ways, basically, but in this way, you’re right in this way. It is not hard for him at all. And so I think he really was like, You know what, our kid will be battling Well, you know, like, that’s an asset. It is. It is great that you want him to be really well. And here he is, right. And he you know, I mean, he even he told me recently they were reading a book about a Mexican American character. And so there’s a lot of Spanish in the book and the girl’s name and whatnot. And he said to me that he had corrected his teacher that that it wasn’t pronounced. He said, I told the teacher that we don’t say Gente, that the G is pronounced like an H. So it’s gente, which means people and I was just for me, it was just like, this beautiful, beautiful moment of him identifying so closely right with being a Spanish speaker and with being part Latin American, and saying we you know, he was like, you don’t say, right, I was like, Oh, my God, that is so beautiful, right? Because he gave me my son, you know, because of his presumption of whiteness has a very different reception in the world, you know, than I do from incidentally as a male as well. And so, I feel sometimes that he defies you know, all of these notions, you know, of who he is and, and that, to me, feels, you know, just just, it’s a celebration for me, because I think he needs to know all of who he is in order to, to, I think, to be more present in the world and to hopefully be more connected to people in the world. That’s That’s my thinking, you know, and that’s what’s behind the whole intentionality of his name and his and his bilingualism.

P: That’s super cool. Well, let me ask you a question. Looking like now that you know what, you know, looking back, is there anything you would you would have told younger you for this journey?

N: Wow.

That’s a great question. I think the one thing I would have told the younger me is to be prepared for, for surprises, you know, to be prepared for the unexpected. I think that when I had been thinking about motherhood, and certainly when I was closer to my within reach, right when I was married and whatnot, and you know, planning it with my husband, I had this idea that I would raise my kid with both of my parents alive and well and their participation in their involvement and I didn’t quite imagine necessarily having a kid who looks so white and wouldn’t be assumed to be mine. And I was wrong on both counts. Right. I ended up having this child with his physical appearance, and losing my father and having to navigate this new normal and this the reality versus sort of the ideal that I had concocted in my brain.

And so I think it would have helped me to know that the unexpected may happen. And I wish I could have been more prepared, I guess, in that sense. You know, I would have told my younger self she knows me like you don’t know what’s going to happen and be prepared for anything to happen basically, because he was he was a rude awakening to realize, like, Oh, this is gonna be a very different journey than what I expected. What I thought I would have and I think now certainly since losing my dad, and since you know, sort of having these immensely transformative experiences happen within a year of each other. I am now that person right now, I know not to think I know what’s going to come. Right. And like, actually, the only thing we know is that we don’t know what’s going to happen. Right. And I think that is actually healthy, sort of more of a protection in a way right? I mean, even with a pandemic, right. I mean, as devastating and as traumatic as it’s been, you know, in gradations, depending on what your personal story is, but I think it’s been globally traumatic, in a way I sort of was like, Okay, this is what we have to live with. Now. Right? This is what we have to deal with to roll with the punches over what they signify. So live in a global pandemic and wear masks and get vaccinated and do remote school and all these pieces. And I feel like my own tragic loss, kind of prepared me for that in a way you know, that tragedy will and may, you may or her and you have to find a way to integrate that tragedy and continue forward.

P: Yeah, that’s good advice for all of us. For younger you and for all of us now.

N: That’s right. Yeah.

P: Naomi thanks so much for sharing your story and I will put a link in the show notes to your book on Amazon.

N: Yes, a link to my book. And if you’d like I can also I can send you a couple of other links to other like through sites of of my work, and you could link those as well. I’m I’m very active on LinkedIn. So maybe that’s also linked if people wanted to connect or so I’ll send you those. I’ll send you more links for you to include in the in the episode.

P: Awesome. Thank you. So much.

N: Thank you, Paulette. This has been great.